| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Kajehase |
Posted - 11 May 2005 : 17:53:06
Here's an idea I've been thinking about on and off for a while as I try to come up with an idea for a way to incorporate an old Swedish boardgame called Drakborgen into the Realms.
The boardgame's plot is that you're an adventurer exploring an ancient castle from which the evil magician T'Siraman once ruled the land, and in which his treasure still lies, guarded by a dragon. As you move around the castle you'll have to fight a multitude of creatures (mostly skeletons and orcs). The person who gets out with the most treasure wins. Oh, and should you be inside the castle when the sun sets you're so much monster-food.
My main train of thought so far has been to place the castle on one of the Nelanther Isles, as the last remain of a Netherese survivor (now dead) who once ruled over all the pirates of the islands. |
| 10 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Kajehase |
Posted - 11 Jul 2005 : 14:49:11
Right-o, here's part 2 (alas, no sea-towers, my idea didn't fit in).
However, this was not to last. In 455 DR, two men would rise to prominence among the pirates of the Nelanther Isles.
One, a necromancer known as T’Siraman has, by the sages at Candlekeep been identified as none other than the Lantanese gnome Lanbrae Blinth – captain of a pirate-ship called the Sea Merrow – that was previously thought to have disappeared from the annals in 452 DR when he is said to have visited the Sea-tower at Irphong.
The other, a lizardfolk captain by the name of Shalzzt Zo’rden that served as the necromancer’s right-hand man according to the one eye-witness account of their exploits.* What brought them together is not known, but in the Year of the Dryad’s Dowry, Shalzzt’s ship made anchor at the island where, what was then still known as the Keep of the Dragon-Queen stood (slowly turning to rubble). T’Siraman entered the building along with his apprentice and lizardfolk second, and when they entered three days later – T’Siraman and the apprentice to gather enough rations for a month’s worth of exploration of the keep, Shalzzt to return to his ship – the mercantile costers running ships through the Run would soon experience a relentless campaign against them, led by a lizardfolk pirate-captain who seemed to make ships flock to his banner, although he never united all of the Pirates like the Black Alaric or Omaena had done.
According to the legends and Halfor’s diary, Shalzzt returned most of the loot from his raids to T’Siraman who used them, among other things, to expand the keep he had made his own into a good-sized castle that covered most of the island’s surface.
In 467 DR (the Year of Four Winds), Shalzzt was killed during a raid on a Calimshani fishing-village where, unbeknownst to him or his pirates, a company of battle-hardened paladins of Tyr were taking their rest after a campaign against monsters in the Purple Hills.
What became of T’Siraman is not known, as his apprentice had left his service by then.
* A diary written by the Necromancer’s apprentice, Halfor Turnipseed, who would later in life retire to Candlekeep in order to write the history of the Nelanther Isles.
There you have it, feedback very welcome. Now I'm going to have to start thinking about the locations current-day status, and make my first PnP-dungeon |
| Kajehase |
Posted - 02 Jul 2005 : 07:42:35
quote:
Originally posted by The Hooded One
Sweet so far, Kajehase. (Ummm, you won't forget the Strip variant, right?  Just kidding.)
Seriously: eagerly awaiting more.
love,
THO
 My humble thanks, sweet Lady of the Hood, there's nothing like praise to encourage one to renewed efforts.
As for the Strip variant, how could I forget a thing such as that , might be a bit hard to work into a piece of history without Storm Silverhand spending some time on the isle as a wood-chopper, though Perhaps if I was given a demonstration of it I might find my inspiration flowing
I was going to have the second part done by now, but has ran into a few snags at work that needs dealing with first (one would think delivering newspapers would keep one safe from such things, no?), but I can say there will be mention of the Seatowers of (among other places) Irphong and Nemessor. |
| The Hooded One |
Posted - 22 Jun 2005 : 04:05:35
Sweet so far, Kajehase. (Ummm, you won't forget the Strip variant, right? Just kidding.)
Seriously: eagerly awaiting more.
love,
THO |
| Kajehase |
Posted - 21 Jun 2005 : 14:00:27
Well, after some thinking and getting sidetracked quite a bit by something called life, I here present Part one of my attempts of placing Drakborgen in the realms.
THE DRAGON KEEP
During the destruction of Helbrester*, one group of its inhabitants managed to get onboard two ships along with their families and ample supplies. Led by Omaena Kolthund, a young but talented wizard from a minor branch of one of the city’s leading families, they settled on a medium-sized isle; building themselves a defensive tower and a small keep around the island’s main source of water, a spring-well rushing forth from a cliff-face at the centre of the isle.
As the refugees flourished in their new home, grandly given the name New Helbrester, they often found themselves forced to repel against pirate-attack, something which usually wasn’t hard, in no small part thanks to the growing mastery of the Art that Omaena evidenced. Ten years after the founding of the community, however, a particularly large assault was made, and in the attack several community-members, including Omaena’s consort and their newborn daughter, was killed before the pirates could be driven back.
The loss drove Omaena quite mad, and she began to divide her time between patrolling the island’s near surroundings and increasing her knowledge of the Art in an obsessive fashion.
Twenty years later after the founding of New Helbrester, Omaena’s patrols had given the island such a fearsome reputation among the pirates that attacks on it had ceased several years before.
Things were far from well though. Driven by a thirst for revenge, Omaena had been driven to evil, and used her Arts to make her shapechange a permanent thing.
Shortly after this took place, she instructed one of her most trusted helpers (most of the population had been turned into her slaves by now) to use the funds he could raise by selling some of her magical items to raise a pirate-fleet of her own.
This done, she set out on a campaign of conquest and terror against all pirates not bowing to her will, gathering new ships, men, and wealth, to her as she went along.
The men and the ships were used to bolster her fleet, which in a matter of four years succeeded in placing all of the Nelanther archipelago under the heel of the Dragon-Queen of Bloodsailors as the mainlanders came to know Omaena.
The wealth was hoarded in the keep on what had once been New Helbrester, now made larger by the slaves that had once been her compatriots and friends.
Omaena could well have become one of the most infamous of Faerûn’s many tyrants, for during twenty years she reigned supreme over the Nelanther Isles, making all passage through them impossible unless she had been paid tribute to.
But, as fate would have it, one thing about her was still human, she would not attain the age of a true dragon, and once she died from it, her empire quickly fell, as her captains squabbled about who would become her heir, leaving behind nothing but her keep, and the legends of untold treasures gathered therein.
*See Lost Empires of Faerûn, page 109-110. |
| LordAnki |
Posted - 29 May 2005 : 19:40:41
This game sounds fun. Well it could be set anywhere really. Mithral Hall before it got reclaimed, sewers, the Noavander(sp) Hold in The High Forest, anywhere. Sounds like a fun campaign too. A good FFA. Heh that'd be cool. |
| Mumadar Ibn Huzal |
Posted - 21 May 2005 : 16:07:50
Hah, seems like the Vikings are invading D&D-land again 
I happen to play in Hymn's Merchant Prince PbeM, which is based on Drakar och Demoner: Handelsfursten. Hymn placed this in the Moonshaes, using the tradelink with Calimshan as established in the Moonshae Trilogy
(As a side-note, this trilogy, according to RAS foreword in the recent printing, features characters which inspired the creation of Drizzt and Guen...) |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 20 May 2005 : 07:22:05
I enjoyed my couple of days in Stockholm - damn hard to get a decent drink of alcohol though and the price for a Pizza Hut pizza was outrageous! Found a good Indian restaurant however! Oh, and I found a mint copy of FR11 Dwarves Deep in Helsingborg, still in the shrink wrap. As mine is a bit ragged, I regret not buying it to this day.
-- George Krashos
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| Tanyn Midrain |
Posted - 20 May 2005 : 07:03:52
Sounds like an interesting idea, looking forward to it.
And by the way, we people of Stockholm are nice at least those of us in the suburb. |
| Kajehase |
Posted - 20 May 2005 : 06:03:00
Strip Drakborgen... 
Now why didn't we ever think of that?
Oh yes, because the only female around the table was our mum.
Slightly more shocked to hear there's actually two nice people living in Stockholm, must be western swedes living in exile.
On the topic of bringing it into the Realms (without making its mini-Undermountainness to obvious) I found myself at a bit of a loss until I read the bit in Lost Empires of Faerûn about the Netherese city in the Nelanthers, this fits perfectly with my initial idea. Now all I have to do is sit down and actually write something down.
(Once I've gotten over the fact that I have even more in common with Ed than having trained to become a librarian) |
| The Hooded One |
Posted - 20 May 2005 : 03:44:23
Ah, Drakborgen! One of Ed’s favourite beer-n-pretzels games!
Many an afternoon at Ed’s cottage we Knights have taken time off from rescuing the Realms to trot into that lair one more time (often Ed introduced new rules or tiles to the game, the latter carefully inked and coloured to try to ‘match’ the published original). Jeem even invented rules for Strip Drakborgen, but I’ve managed to forget them, really I have . . .
Ed bought his copy years ago, when he was Guest of Honour at a convention in Stockholm (he remembers the con and his two hosts very fondly).
THO
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